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Recently I had the privilege to visit Pre-service training (PST) for the new group of Peace Corps Volunteers. It made me realize that I had completely forgotten how it felt to begin. Since PST I've seen how expectations are set and unmet again and again. Yet I've seen outcomes that have been more wild than what I hoped. Outcomes like how the Lisu hill tribe girls who would typically get married by high school weren't while I was there, or showing my co-teacher how the class of all boys labeled with learning disabilities could succeed, or how meeting a deep personal darkness made me whole.
As the two years passed I became a bit jaded, but I can't remember when that happened. It probably started around the "mid-service slump", a time when a lot of volunteers experience an increase in discouragement; or a lack of resolve. Ironically, that time coincided with an increase in projects and progress. I started holding more Sexual Reproductive Health classes and hos…